Getting a story to the top of Digg pays off with a significant bump in visitors. LtGenPanda is pointing the finger at Digg, suggesting that the site was artifically boosting items to appear more useful to it partners.

For a company in crisis, this is a potentially damaging blow. Digg already lost the trust of its users with their redesign, and if these same folks feel that their contribution to the site is being overshadowed by businesses ties, they may abandon Digg altogether.